Inside Politics: Soares kicks off campaign in a familiar place

Updated 4:57 pm, Thursday, May 31, 2012

Democratic County Legislator Shawn Morse announces his candidacy for state Senate against Neil Breslin in the 44th Senate District during a gathering of supporters at Ogden Mills apartments in Cohoes N.Y. Wednesday May 2, 2012. (Michael P. Farrell/Times Union)

So Albany County District Attorney David Soares will formally launch his second re-election campaign Monday morning — a sort of official kick-start to a testy contest between him and fellow Democrat Lee Kindlon that has already been rolling for months now.

The city-owned park across from City Hall was the site of his first campaign announcement eight years ago as an upstart Democrat who eventually took out the party-backed DA and, more recently, home to the Occupy Albany protesters whom Soares' refusal to prosecute has made the county's top prosecutor an even more polarizing figure than he already was.

And that's kind of saying a lot.

Asked whether the Occupy link was symbolic or coincidental, Soares campaign spokesman Brad Maionenoted that the coincidence had not escaped the campaign's attention.

If we here at Insider might make a humble suggestion, it would be that the campaign refrain from erecting any tents or inadvertently straying into a state-owned Lafayette Park.

Good news, though: The word out of City Hall Thursday morning was that the campaign had indeed applied for a permit.

While they've denied any involvement in his primary candidacy against state Sen. Neil Breslin, members of the Senate's Independent Democratic Conference had nothing but swell things to say about Albany County Legislature Chairman Shawn Morse on Wednesday.

"He's an outstanding legislator. He's certainly the type of person who would do very well with the IDC," Westchester Sen. Jeff Klein said at an event at which the renegade quartet of Democrats announced they were being backed by the statewide Independence Party. "If Shawn Morse makes the ballot and is a candidate we're really going to think long and hard about him as one of our potential IDC candidates."

The IDC broke from the larger Democratic conference when it slipped into the minority after the 2010 elections.

Klein was never modest about his ambition to lead the conference, and he grew frustrated with the leadership of Sens. Malcolm Smith and John Sampson

From its island, the IDC has regularly thrown grenades at its former Democratic colleagues, including Breslin, who was elevated to Klein's position of deputy leader.

It has also flirted with majority Republicans in the chamber, giving them the sheen of bipartisanship on some issues, and a comforting cushion of votes. In turn, they've found themselves with a nice suite of offices.

At his campaign announcement last month, Morse said he had not been asked or encouraged by the IDC to take on Breslin, an eight-term incumbent and the brother of former County Executive Michael Breslin, with whom Morse and the County Legislature sometimes clashed.

Commisso Jr., 27, who works for the state comptroller's office and is serving his first term representing the 15th Ward on the Common Council, became the fifth Democrat to officially enter the race. Not counting those who were in before they were out.

(Disclosure: Commisso's formal announcement was scheduled for 4 p.m., after this column's deadline.)

"I feel like I have a high probability of success," Commisso said earlier in the day.

Commisso also turned aside the speculation from some quarters that his father, County Legislature Majority Leader Frank Commisso, was only in the race as placeholder for him, a scarecrow of sorts to dissuade others from entering the race. The younger Commisso noted his father even left his job at the Port of Albany to run.

"Many people did feel that he had a strong chance of being successful in this race," he said.

Commisso Jr.'s entrance brings the total number of announced Democrats to five, the others being: former Albany school board member Patricia Fahy, County Legislator Christopher Higgins, attorney William McCarthy and state legislative staffer Margarita Perez All five are from the city of Albany and all are in — or have just left — state government jobs.

Ballot petitioning begins next week, and the Democrats are jockeying for the right to face Guilderland Republican Ted Danz and Albany Conservative Party member Joseph Sullivan in the general election. All are trying to succeed longtime Assemblyman Jack McEneny, who is retiring.

Another interesting note: Commisso will be the youngest candidate in a Democratic field in which three of the five candidates — Commisso Jr., McCarthy (30) and Higgins (32) — are under 35.

In other news from that Assembly race: While McEneny has made no signs that he will publicly endorse a successor in the primary, he told Insider last week that he would "not endorse" a candidate hostile to the proposed Albany Convention Center. McEneny, who serves on the board of the Albany Convention Center Authority at the pleasure of Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, remains one of the $220 million project's biggest boosters. Higgins, who represents the downtown neighborhoods around Center Square, has been among its biggest critics.